Neighbor Dog

“Neighbor dog sure looks lonesome, dozing in the back of that little pen they built for him.”

It still tears me up inside. I still wonder: why did they get a dog? Just to have him wither away in their backyard? And they got such a good one. Not only a beauty, but a dog with so much love in him. Even now, after these stagnant years, I think there is still quite a bit of love in him, but I’m afraid a lot of the spirit has been sapped out of him by now.

“And he kind of reminds you of someone else, doesn’t he?”

Myself. Yes, I do feel that the dog is a metaphor for my own life. Except I’m no beauty and I might not be the most ‘loving’ person in the world. But, still...

You let the cats out already?

"You let the cats out already?

Well, it's four o'clock and the skies are still overcast, and we are in the lowest nineties. Why enforce their restlessness?

"You mean Sammy's restlessness."

Yeah, but Ash and Coco were obviously aching to go, too.

I'm surprised by how moderate the weather is proving to be. But I'm still thinking that maybe this is actually more normal, than the fiery furnace I've been expecting. And maybe I should expect to let the cats be until at least the last week in June. But I don't know. We've also already had 100-degree days. Maybe it's best to play it by ear: Spring day today? let them go. Summer scorcher today? keep them in.

watching TV together

"Why did you stay in the big room so long? Did you have something to talk about with your dad?"

Oh, no. The laptop had thirteen updates to churn through, and it was taking some time. I'm hoping that maybe these updates include a fix for this malware that is redirecting me every place.

"Was it odd sitting next to him?"

Not in a bad way. I found myself regretting that we did not get in the habit of watching TV together. There was a little frame of time when we did. Not just me and Pop, but with Mother too. Back in the Bay Horse days, when we got our first big-screen TV. We used to watch TV together in the evenings pretty regularly. We even watched some of the Olympics together. I remember that I had control over the remote-controller.

"What happened? Did that end with the move to here?>

No. It ended much sooner than that. I cannot remember why that stopped. I wish I could. Was it when Jack and Jill moved back into the house? Did I get more interested in reading? Did Mother piss me off so that I couldn't stand being by her side? I can't remember.

"Well, there's nothing stopping you now."

Heh, aside from being awkward, I don't think I could stand to watch country & western shows. While I was waiting for the updates to download, Pop was watching Ralph Emery.

"That does sound tough."

It was interesting to see Pop lose himself and start singing along to a song. I think the guest was Peggy Lee, and the lyric was something like, "we may not have a barrel of money", and I was thinking that Pop may not be able to remember more than the merest scraps, but he certainly catches the buzz phrase, and isn't that enough? It's his poetry and literature.

"And you don't think you can get into it?"

It's not my poetry and literature.